If I had to choose one word to describe Ruby Modine that word would be adorable. She’s animated, energetic and passionate about art. During our interview, we discovered that our creative processes often start with painting. I’d love to spend the day painting with her! Ruby Modine recently released two songs, Tell Me a Story and Radio, with demos available on SoundCloud. Ruby’s sound is very original. She credits her influences to Amy Winehouse, Joan Jett and Taylor Momsen from the group The Pretty Reckless. She has yet to record a song in her genre, which is hard rock and metal. Her next song with her newly formed band Your Wyldest Dream will be much harder and louder, so she’s really excited. Ruby’s musical career began with story writing in elementary school. She’s visual, so her process starts with writing what she visualizes down on paper. Ruby also paints and draws what she sees in her mind. She writes stories too. All her creative outlets combine into inspirations for her songs. “It’s a long process, but I really do like it, because it really makes me think, it really makes me get all of the emotions that I’m thinking about out on paper.” Acting is Ruby’s first passion and it’s exciting to see her acting career really taking off. She’s currently working on four projects: Memoria, Violence and Women, Julia and a film in pre-production called The Bagman. She begins filming Memoria in October. The film is based on James Franco’s book Palo Alto and will be directed by Nina Ljeti. This will be her second film by James Franco. It’s a cool coming-of-age story about teenagers roaming around California, skateboarding, partying and falling in love. Ruby describes Violence and Women as incredible. It’s a dark comedy feature film directed by Chad Ostrom that begins shooting in New York in March 2014. It’s grim, gory and amazing. I’m intrigued. The Bagman is an animated film Directed by Christopher Stoudt. They’ve created a Ruby cartoon character, which is “really, really rad.” Julia is a short film directed by her father, Matthew Modine, another Amused Now featured artist, and Leon Vitale. When I asked Ruby what it’s like to work for a parent, she told me, “Honestly, it’s amazing!” She describes it like this, “you have a relationship with your parents, but when you break that boundary and go into work mode, that’s no longer present. You’re listening more for the advice that they’re giving you. My father has always been a very big mentor for me.” They advise each other and have cultivated a fabulous give-and-take working relationship. Although Ruby has a social media presence, she says that “I’m not really into social networking,” mainly because she had some prior bad experiences with Facebook. She has a lot of fun on Twitter as @rubymodine, meeting new people (like me) and promoting music and bands that she loves. Ruby has a website that she keeps up-to-date. Plus, she recently opened an Instagram account, launched between our video interview and posting of this article. Ruby is also in the process of creating a new Facebook page and giving that another try. Ruby enjoys talking to everybody. “A lot of people say you’re supposed to use social networking to talk to specific people, but I think you should talk to everybody. That’s why I like promoting myself.” Ruby’s advice to young artists: hard work. “There are days that you cry because the dream that you want is taking so long, but it really does come from hard work. You have to wake up every day and have a new goal. Seriously, you get what you put in. My advice is to have a dream and work towards it and never give up. Stay as positive as you can.” It’s been fabulous getting to know you Ruby. To watch the complete video interview on the Amused Now YouTube...